earticle

영어

The widespread use of media streaming services has resulted in a radical surge in network traffic, triggering debates on network usage fees between internet service providers (ISPs) and content providers (CPs). As a response to network usage fees imposed by ISPs, CPs can opt to provide discriminatory service quality as a means of mitigating costs associated with high traffic volume. In 2022, a leading Korean ISP charged discriminatory network usage fees to Twitch TV, the world’s largest media streaming platform, due to its excessive network traffic. In response, Twitch implemented a service quality reduction policy for Korean viewers. Our study exploits this event as our treatment and examines the impact of this service quality reduction policy on the streaming platform ecosystem. Our results indicate that the implementation of this service quality policy led to a remarkable decline in the number of viewers, which then resulted in adverse effects for streamers. This study contributes to the literature on network neutrality violation by offering empirical evidence.